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<div class="field field-name-field-type-of-talk field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Type Of Talk:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_type_of_talk%3A1">Darshan</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-event field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Event:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_event%3A81">Narasimha Chaturdasi</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-location field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Location:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_location%3A43">Saint Louis - Missouri</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-date field-type-datetime field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Date:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><span class="date-display-single">Thursday, May 6, 1982</span></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-unique-id field-type-text field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Unique ID:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">19820506-Nrsimha-Caturdasi-Evening-Darshan-for-Devotees-St.Louis-Literal-Version</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-collection field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Collection:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_collection%3A35">Enlightenment 1</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-soundcloud-embed-code field-type-text-long field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Audio player:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><iframe width="100%" height="166" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F178423815&show_artwork=true&maxheight=166&color=ff9900"></iframe></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><p>19820506-Nrsimha-Caturdasi-Evening-Darshan-for-Devotees-St.Louis-Literal-Version</p>
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<p>The following is a class given by His Holiness, Jayapataka Swami Maharaja on May 6th, 1982 in St. Louis.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami:</p>
<p>oṁ ajñāna-timirāndhasya</p>
<p>jñānāñjana-śalākayā</p>
<p>cakṣur unmīlitaṁ yena</p>
<p>tasmai śrī-gurave namaḥ</p>
<p>śrī-caitanya-mano-'bhīṣṭaṁ</p>
<p>sthāpitaṁ yena bhū-tale</p>
<p>svayaṁ rūpaḥ kadā mahyaṁ</p>
<p>dadāti sva-padāntikam</p>
<p>nama oṁ viṣṇu-pādāya kṛṣṇa-preṣṭhāya bhū-tale</p>
<p>śrīmate bhaktivedānta-svāmin iti nāmine</p>
<p>namas te sārasvate deve gaura-vāṇī-pracāriṇe</p>
<p>nirviśeṣa-śūnyavādi-pāścātya-deśa-tāriṇe</p>
<p>namo mahā-vadānyāya</p>
<p>kṛṣṇa-prema-pradāya te</p>
<p>kṛṣṇāya kṛṣṇa-caitanya-</p>
<p>nāmne gaura-tviṣe namo namaḥ</p>
<p>he kṛṣṇa karuṇā-sindho</p>
<p>dīna-bandho jagat-pate</p>
<p>gopeśa gopikā-kānta</p>
<p>rādhā-kānta namo 'stu te</p>
<p>tapta-kāñcana-gaurāṅgi</p>
<p>rādhe vṛndāvaneśvari</p>
<p>vṛṣabhānu-sute devi</p>
<p>praṇamāmi hari-priye</p>
<p>jaya sri krsna…</p>
<p>jaya śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya</p>
<p>prabhu-nityānanda</p>
<p>jayadvaita gadādhara</p>
<p>śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vṛnda</p>
<p>hare kṛṣṇa hare kṛṣṇa</p>
<p>kṛṣṇa kṛṣṇa hare hare</p>
<p>hare rāma hare rāma</p>
<p>rāma rāma hare hare</p>
<p>mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ</p>
<p>paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim</p>
<p>yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande</p>
<p>śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāraṇam</p>
<p>paramananda madhavam</p>
<p>sri-caitanya isvaram</p>
<p>You know that Murari Gupta was reading the thousand names of Vishnu and then when he got up to the name of Lord Nrsimhadeva, Lord Caitanya became absorbed in the mood as the incarnation of Nrsimhadeva and He… grabbing a club, He started roaring and He ran outside on the street yelling, “I am going to kill all those demons.” Just was running out on the streets and when Lord Caitanya did that then the people, they became afraid to see Him roaring and running down the street. Then He could see all the people running away and then He came to His external consciousness thinking, “Well, it’s not good to cause fear in the ordinary people. Srivas and Murari Gupta, they said, “Well, everyone by simply seeing You, Lord Caitanya, they have all been liberated. They have all been delivered.”</p>
<p>There are several six-handed forms of Lord Caitanya. Of course the main one we know is Lord Caitanya, two arms kamandalu and danda, the two arms holding the flute, and two arms: one holding the bow and arrow of Lord Ramachandra. One other six armed form is there some panditas say sometimes the Lord showed with two arms as Krishna, two arms as Caitanya and two arms as Narasimha. In the Narasimha the two hands, one is this way and one is this way. One is up and one is down. Does anyone know why the difference?</p>
<p>Devotee: One is for ripping apart. The other is for holding the entrails.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: (Laughing) No.</p>
<p>Devotee: One is for killing. One is for offering benediction?</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: (Inaudible) One is for blessing Prahlada on the head. And the other one is ripping apart. You got one hand right. So, Lord Caitanya is the ocean of mercy and within Him all the avatars are there. Sometimes when Srila Prabhupada observed these appearance days of Vishnu avataras, he would mention a little about the ten avatars or about a number of the avataras because they are all coming from Krishna. But we worship Them in that relationship, not that specifically we set up different temples for each Deity.</p>
<p>I haven’t been to Andhra Pradesh to see all the Andhra Pradesh temples, maybe Vaisesika has been there, but I understand that there is one special Nrsimha deity that devotees come from thousands of miles to see and the deity is offered a mix of water and gur made into like a guraide (Devotees laugh) And one whole glass is given by the devotee and they offer it with the Tulasi down the throat of the Deity. His mouth is open and they put it down and apparently it makes a gurgle, gur gur gur sound and then the Deity spits out half a cup of the gur drink and that is given back as the prasada. Did you see that? Maybe you can give us more detail.</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: I went there with Bhakti Svarupa Maharaja, and we brought a big bowl of this gur water, we bought it for eight rupees, and then you take it in. The pujari does a special puja for you and you know, says your name and Deity and things, asks for a special benediction (devotees laughing) and then we…</p>
<p>Devotee: You can buy different (inaudible)</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Did you put in a good word there for Sura dasa? (Devotees laughing)</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: So, what he does is… no matter what size the bowl is… you can buy different sizes, so he offers them in conchshells. He fills up the conchshell once and he pours it down Nrsimhadeva’s mouth, and then he pours another one, and pours another, but when it gets halfway down, no matter what size there is, He stops. He doesn’t take any more, and He leaves the rest. He just… He wont drink any more. It just won’t go down, after half. And if the container’s small, He’ll drink half the small container, and leave the rest, then they give you that as prasada.<br />
Jaya Nrsimhadeva.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Nrsimha Bhagavan ki</p>
<p>Devotees: Jaya!</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Then there is another temple that He’s in His ferocious mood. So I understand the whole year they keep Him covered with a thick coating of sandalwood, its in Visakapatnam, you probably saw it (inaudible) and to keep Him cool, they cover Him with sandalwood. And once a year, I think maybe today, Nrsimha Caturdasi or, once a year they take off the sandalwood and then again put… one day you can see the actual Deity and then they cover up again with sandalwood to keep Him cool.</p>
<p>Is that how it…</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: Yeah.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Details?</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: Well, Viskahapatnam is a beautiful temple. It’s uh… there’s huge steps going from about half a mile, all the way up: granite steps. They’ve built all the way up on the top of the hill, and there’s waterfalls coming down and everything, a very beautiful setting. Andhra-pradesh is like uh… real tropical, and then when you get to the top there’s a main temple and inside… there’s many other temples. The main temple’s Nrsimhadeva, and it’s a huge… all you can see when you go in for darsana, is a huge lump of candana. And it’s like… you know, looks like a lingam almost… a siva-lingam, just like, candana, you know? And then uh, the uh, you know once a year, for candana-yatra, they go and they take all the candana off. Thousands of people come and they see it’s Varaha-nrsimha… a form of Varaha-nrsimha. As they say that form of Nrsimhadeva was the one that caught Prahlada Maharaja when he jumped off the cliff… or when he was thrown off the cliff by uh, Hiranyakasipu, and he was caught by Varaha-nrsimha. That’s what they say and if they don’t keep Him covered with candana, then any demon or sinful person who sees Him, He’ll just burn ‘em to ashes.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Gotta be very careful. (laughter) Then of course after Lord Nrsimhadeva performed the pastime of killing Hiranyakashipu, and then He washed His hands in a lake (inaudible) and then He traversed over the… and He went to Navadweep and rested there. So there, all the demigods, they took the form as villagers and there were different hills, like Indratila, Arkatila, different hills that… they had seven hills and they all came and were worshiping Lord Nrsimhadeva like menial servants.</p>
<p>This year, during the parikrama, ISKCON devotees had the great fortune of visiting and when they went there, there was the lake where the present Deity was recovered in the (inaudible) hills. So the devotees when they find a nice lake in the hot weather they know how to advantage so, taking the dips in the holy dhama. So Lord Nrsimha, and all the different incarnations, they always go to Navadvipa dham. Navadvipa dham is eternal dham. Just like Ayodhya, Mathura.</p>
<p>It is not just that when Lord Ramachandra came, Avyodhya became pure. Ayodhya was always a holy dham because that is the eternal dhama of Ramachandra. Every time He comes, He comes there. Just like recently the Secretary of State went running here and there, went back and forth between Britain and Argentina. So when he would go to Britain he would stop in the embassy and when he went to Argentina he would stop in the embassy because that’s like his home away from home, that is the American property. So like that similar to some degree, the Supreme Lord, when He comes to the material world, He has got His particular dhamas which are directly under His personal, internal potency, His protection. So naturally, He will prefer to rest or to have any pastime in His dhama.</p>
<p>So like when Lord Nrsimha comes He knows that “This is the place where I have My lilas in the Kali yuga. This is the holy dhama.” It doesn’t mean that just because the lilas are done there in Kali yuga, in the other yugas They cannot recognize that this is Their eternal place. Even for instance, there was a king called Suvarna and he was a very materialistic king. He was always worshipping different demigods and trying to get opulence, material fame and power. Name, fame and glory, it is the same old story! It is a new song by Srila Vishnupada – didn’t hear it? Name, fame and glory, it is the same old story! So that is what he wanted. Name, fame and glory, he wanted money, he wanted profit and he was doing so much giving charity, worshipping the brahmanas and so many different things. One day Narada Muni came and told him that “You are wasting your time. Why are you simply wasting all your energy for this material world? The things of this material world will not last. You will not be satisfied. You don’t know that you are living in the holy place of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. You should worship Caitanya Mahaprabhu here and you will get the complete fulfilment of all your desire.” He explained to him who Lord Caitanya was and how He was so merciful.</p>
<p>So Suvarna, the king, even though it was before the Kali-yuga, other yugas, he was worshipping and Lord Caitanya appeared to him and he was just completely overwhelmed to have the holy darshan of Lord Caitanya even it wasn’t in the Kali yuga, but Lord Caitanya is always in His holy dhama. He bowed down to… the king, to Lord Caitanya, paid his obeisances and he jumped up and down and was almost fainting and getting up and finally he prayed to the Lord that “Please don’t forget me. How can I… When will I be able to participate in Your transcendental pastimes?”
So then Lord Caitanya said that “Don’t worry, you will take birth as Buddhimanta Khan during My pastimes.”
So like this there are so many different pastimes in the holy dham over the ages. So similarly all the different avatars visit the holy dhama and have Their pastimes. Just like in the Dvapara-yuga, Balaram, He visited the holy dham of Mayapura and He killed the Mayasura demon and still there is the field where He killed him, known as the Mayamara Matha or the place where the Maya demon was killed.</p>
<p>When Bhima took the Rajasuya horse and he came up to Mayapura, at that time, there was a king there called King Samudra. So he knew that Bhima was a great devotee of Lord Sri Krishna and then he decided that “I am going to attack Bhima.” You know that how they send the horse, Rajasuya yagna horse, they send off the horse in a different direction. And if the horse goes into the kingdom without being obstructed, then that kingdom is considered to be under the domain of the king who is doing this Rajasuya sacrifice. If they obstruct the horse or if they catch it, that is war.</p>
<p>So the king Samudra tried to capture the horse and he attacked Bhima and he fought so furiously that Bhima was put into a very, very difficult situation. So much so that he thought it was going to be the end. So at that time, Krishna immediately appeared and saved Bhima. Which was all that that king Samudra wanted. So he immediately paid his obeisances to Krishna and said “I just wanted to get Your darshana.” And Kshatriyas: you know that’s how… the way they do things. (laughter)</p>
<p>So in that way Krishna also He came to the holy dhama of Navadvipa. So like that when Lord Nrsimhadeva appeared, He also came into Navadvipa and He was there worshipped by the different demigods and devotees in a very intimate way.</p>
<p>Jayadeva who wrote the song that we sing to Lord Nrsimhadeva</p>
<p>tava kara-kamala-vare nakham adbhuta-śṛṅgaṁ</p>
<p>dalita-hiraṇyakaśipu-tanu-bhṛṅgam</p>
<p>keśava dhṛta-narahari-rūpa jaya jagadīśa hare</p>
<p>jaya jagadīśa hare</p>
<p>jaya jagadīśa hare</p>
<p>Was written in Jagannatha Puri on Lord Jagannatha I believe. But he also actually lived in Mayapura before he went to Jagannath Puri. There is a place not too far from the birthplace of Lord Caitanya known as Jayadeva Patha. We also went by the Jayadeva Patha this year on our parikrama.</p>
<p>Here is the birthplace of Lord Caitanya, devotees. Here is the parikrama going out unlimited lengths heading toward the Jayadeva Patha. Here are some local villagers offering puja to our Nitai Gaur. Can I have one picture of the Jayadeva Patha? Don’t have it. That was the day they went… Anyway here is looking over the Long Building. So Jayadeva Patha is just over here. Just opposite the birthplace of Lord Caitanya. Out in the field there.</p>
<p>So what happened was that Lakshman Sen was a great devotee and he sent a message that he would like to see Jayadev and make him like his guru because of his poetry. When Jayadeva heard that this king wanted to see him, he said, “No, I am leaving Navadvipa, I won’t associate with any king or worldly people.” He was a pure Brahmana. He said, “Now I am leaving Navadweep, I can’t stay.”</p>
<p>So then Lakshman Sen, he came disguised as an ordinary person and he fell down at the feet of Jayadeva and he paid his obeisances and he begged him that “You have said you are going to leave Navadvipa but I want to beg you not to completely leave Navadvipa.” That, “I may be a king but nonetheless I need the association of devotees, so if you could only just go to the other side of the river and live there, then in that way, we would not be completely bereft from your association.” Some appeal he made for him to stay in any case.</p>
<p>Jayadeva said, “I will stay on the other side of the river, I was testing you by saying you are a worldly person, you are a king therefore I won’t associate with you but I see that you are actually a Vaishnava. So you can come and see me but you have to come in disguise. But because I said I was leaving Navadvipa, I won’t go back on my word, I am going over to the other side and I will stay there.” So that was Champahatti. You went to see Champahatti? Gaur Gadadhara temple. Here’s in the Gaur Gadadhara temple, all the devotees have seen. And that was the big big Gaur Gadadhara temple by Vaninatha I believe… Vaninatha, or… not Vaninatha by another devotee… associate of Lord Caitanya had those Deities carved. And nearby there was where our respected Jayadeva lived.</p>
<p>And the reason that’s called Champahatti is because the champa flowers, there are so many orchards there of these champa flowers. Goloka champa, have you ever smelled Goloka champa? It is just a very sweet flower. So sweet, so nectarine that it is just like the… uh, like a spiritual fragrance. Apparently these… Champa is mentioned in the Bhagavatam as one of the pious, auspicious flowers. So this flower is especially used to worship Krishna.</p>
<p>The gopis used to come all the way from Vrindavan and pick flowers… these champa flowers and bring them back for the raasa lila. Some of the gopis had the special power to be able to do this. So all the orchards were there but then as Kali-yuga came, then the local people started taking the flowers and selling them. So hatti means, like namahatta, hatti, Champahatti means the market place of champa flowers. So today there are not so many champa flowers, you can still see many trees but the name is still there, Champahatti. So that was where Jayadeva was living in that forest of champa flowers, Goloka champa and he was writing some poetry.</p>
<p>At that time Krishna appeared to him… Caitanya Mahaprabhu appeared to him when he requested he wanted to see Him in His two handed form as Krishna. So then He appeared as Krishna. Then Jayadeva was satisfied that he wanted to see Krishna in Navadvipa. But the Lord then commanded him that he should go to Jagannatha Puri and that there he had important service that he had to do, that Lord Jagannatha wanted him. So like that there are so many unlimited pastimes that are going on in the holy dham. So also when Nrsimhadeva appeared, He went to the holy dham of Navadvipa Mayapur.</p>
<p>So we take the opportunity of visiting the holy dham to become purified from offences and to become fixed up in devotional service to</p>
<p>śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya</p>
<p>prabhu-nityānanda</p>
<p>śrī-advaita gadādhara</p>
<p>śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vṛnda</p>
<p>This was the order of Srila Prabhupad. Actually our Prahlada Maharaja, he was always remembering Krishna. This is his special quality that Prahlada, he always remembers Krishna, he doesn’t forget. When he was thrown into difficulties, thrown off the cliff and different difficulties, he would never forget Krishna. Actually he was the prince. He had unlimited opportunity to enjoy. His father had defeated even Indra, every material opulence was at his disposal. But instead he was always focused on becoming Krishna conscious. So this irritated his father to no end, that why his son could not being the standard, materialistic demon, and maintain the family tradition. Why Prahlada had to be a devotee?</p>
<p>When Prahlads was telling his father that you should not… he said, “You’re working for the enemy.”
He said “Where is the question of enemy? One who controls his senses has no enemies and no friends, like that, he’s equal to everyone.”</p>
<p>And then his father got angry and said “You think are better in controlling your senses than me? Well, I’ll show you, I will kill you, you puffed up brat! Why don’t you be a demon like I tell you?”</p>
<p>Of course even in modern day society one can find some little bit partly perverted and partly similar reflections.</p>
<p>[Break]</p>
<p>Said,“I am only hoping to be purified from that and born in the family of demons naturally I am attached to material enjoyment but I do not want it, I simply want to be a pure devotee and serve Your lotus feet.”</p>
<p>So we advise on this auspicious day to take shelter of Prahlad Maharaja, pray for his…</p>
<p>[break]</p>
<p>…we can follow his footsteps by our desire for pure devotional service. Na me bhakta pranashyati – Lord Caitanya, Krishna, promises “My devotee shall never perish.”</p>
<p>Jaya śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya</p>
<p>prabhu-nityānanda</p>
<p>śrī-advaita gadādhara</p>
<p>śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vṛnda</p>
<p>Any questions?</p>
<p>Devotee: It’s not really on the subject we’re on, I thought you might not mind if I asked you if you could describe something about Gangamata Gosvam…</p>
<p>[break]</p>
<p>Devotee: I was just reading in the Adi-lila, Volume Two if I’m correct.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: I don’t know but I’m just asking (inaudible) She is one of the great female preachers in the Krishna consciousness movement, you see. She gets special blessing from her father who was Lord Nityananda. She and uh, Virbhadra prabhu, Virchandra, they were born at Kharada from Vasudha. Two wives of Lord Nityananda – Jahnava and Vasudha. Jahnava is Revati and Vasudha is Varuni, Lord Balarama’s two consorts. And still today there is a shrine built for the Samadhi of the umbilical cord of Gangamata Goswamini and Virbhadra prabhu. [Editors note: Ganga-devi, the daughter of Lord Nityananda is different from Ganga-mata Gosvamini, who was formerly a princess. See: Caitanya-caritamrta Adi-lila 8.60 Purport.]</p>
<p>Of course there is much more known about Virbhadra prabhu. There is a whole book on it that gives the details of Ganga-devi and Virbhadra. I know some of the pastimes of Virbhadra but very few of Ganga-devi. I have… doing some research now on Ganga-devi. She married Madhavacarya dasa. Sri Madhavacarya. First, they were living in the district of Burdwan near Krishnadas Kaviraj’s birthplace. At one time they were also living in the district of Hooghly. So in the district of Burdwan near Jamatpur where that shrine was destroyed in a flood and we are trying to procure the land and rebuild this small shrine there to commemorate that place. And the temple for Ganga-devi Gosvamini in Hooghly district, we have just contributed ten thousand rupees to fix it up. But I haven’t gone there myself. I was hoping that when I go there we will find out more details about her pastimes. But I understand that she also did some considerable preaching.</p>
<p>Jahnava devi of course had thousands of disciples and followers. And she did a whole – she attended the first Gaura Purnima festival held by… sponsored by Narottama dasa Thakura at Keturi and Srinivas Acarya, Virbhadra prabhu, Acyutananda and many, many other second generation associates of Lord Caitanya, they were there. Because by that time already Nityananda, Advaita, the Pancha Tattva, they had all disappeared but Ramai the younger brother of Srivas went there, the two younger brothers went. And Raghunandan Thakur from Srihatta… Srikhanda and many other devotees literally a thousand principal remaining associates went and thousands of their disciples, like Ramachandra Kaviraja, Shyamananda Pandit I believe, also went with his followers. And then from there Jahnava devi went to see the birthplace of Nityananda, her husband. And from there she went to Vrndavana and then she had some pastimes in Vrndavan. Somehow I believe that in some of these pastimes she is reflecting the personality of Ananga-manjari. There’s the two… but I don’t… I haven’t understood it exactly and I haven’t read any commentary by the acaryas except that the Gaura Ganodesha Dipika mentions Prabhupada… that she’s both like when she is in Vrndavan and other places.</p>
<p>She’s… in Vrndavana there was a very special pastime in Radha Kunda but I don’t remember it just now. There was a special pastime in Radha Kunda – either she got the Radha Kunda excavated in a big way or something happened in Radha Kunda, I just can’t remember it just now. But Jahnava devi was very active. She went to Vrndavan and again she came back. I believe she went twice to Vrndavan. So for a lady for a woman to walk to Vrndavan… she would always have… like when she went to Keturi then she had Minaketana Ramadas, Vrndavandas Thakur, so many different Nityananda Parshada: Abhiram das Thakur and many other.</p>
<p>I believe that Gangadevi Goswamini is an incarnation of Mother Ganges. And Madhavacarya must be Maharaja Santanu. She always lives in the Ganges.</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: Is it also true that Jagai and Madhai were incarnations of Jaya and Vijaya? The reason I ask is because I was… because they were supposed to take three births, right? But I thought that that would be their forth birth because…</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: They took birth in Caitanya-lila because three births was, they were killed by the Lord but the fourth birth they were given Krishna Prema. You see because they said that the Chand Kazi was the Kamsa of the Caitanya-lila. So, he’s the Kamsa of the Caitanya-lila. That was my conclusion that they would put him as one of Jaya and Vijaya because they came as Kamsa and Shishupal. Isn’t that how it works?</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: It’s Sisupala and Dantavakra, in Krishna…</p>
<p>Jaypataka Swami: Is that it? Well then, Dantavakra and Sisupala, and Kamsa just another. So Chand Kazi is Kamsa.</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: I was just recently reading Krishna book again. I thought that there was something that I didn’t understand all this time, that Srila Prabhupada explains in the third canto about how His devotees will take birth as demons you know, to assist Him in His pastimes, and sometimes He likes to fight so He wants to fight with devotees. So I just wondered that uh, it seems like, when you read Krishna Book sometimes you’ll see that it just seems that it’s an ordinary demon or it’s not explained so much, but then in another place Srila Prabhupada said that when Krishna fights, He just wants to fight with His devotees, that it’s more fun than just anybody.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Then in another place Srila Prabhupad said that we should not think that every time Krishna wants to fight a demon a devotee has to fall down from the spiritual world so that He can do it.
Vaisesika Prabhu: That may just be demons in the material world, or something.
Jayapataka Swami: I thought I saw your hand. That’s what happens when you have a late prasadam. All the blood has gone out of your head. (laughter)
How did you like the preaching in South India?</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: It was ecstatic. It’s really expanding.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Tell them about the cards. (inaudible)</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: Oh, the cards. When there’s a large function, Srila Pra… Acaryapada has these special cards that are like… kind of a little contract that he passes out through all the crowds there. The Indians really love it. It says that they vow to chant one round of the Hare Krishna mantra on the beads every day, at least one time a day. So he gets the people to agree in the crowd that they’ll chant one roudn of the Hare Krishna mantra, so there’s anybody that doesn’t object to doing this? And many people raise their hand, and he says, “Okay come up and get your card.” And then they come and get their card and they all fill it out, that they agree: “I such and such, agree to chant one round of Hare Krishna.” Then they bring it back and Srila Pra… Acarypada signs it and it’s serrated so they get to keep one part.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: They keep the certificates. That part has picture… Lord Caitanya’s picture, certifying that he promised with Hare Krishna mantra, Panca-tattva mantra. We get the whatever has the name and address and everything. (laughter)</p>
<p>Devotee: Do they keep their vows.</p>
<p>Vaisesika Prabhu: It was big (inaudible)</p>
<p>Jayaptaka Swami: People are serious, very serious. They take it. I met one person, he started off that way. What happened, there was this guy called Mr. Poddar who came to see me and… there were so many people. It was we were give a darshan of some Indian people and some devotees in Bangalore. (laughter)</p>
<p>(aside)</p>
<p>Devotee: (inaudible) (laughter)</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: (inaudible) just a firecracker. We don’t allow firecrackers.</p>
<p>We were preaching and then he came up and he was asking so many questions and he kept challenging the Personality of Godhead and I was trying to present that Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Then he said that… to make a long story short, he kept insisting in different ways… about impersonality, real Mayavadi. So then he said something that “We want to merge.” and something like that.</p>
<p>I became very impatient and I said that “You take your lunch and you have your chapatti, you have your rice, you have your dal, take it and merge it. Merge and then eat! We are disgusted by this merging. We want vaicitra, variety of Krishna’s personality, Krishna’s pastimes, Krishna… everything it is all transcendental.” So then in the end I gave the same appeal to him that you should chant 108 times. So then I told him that “This is the order of Lord Caitanya that I have to beg you to please chant. So I am begging you to please take up this chanting Hare Krishna.” And he was so startled that after the whole hour discussion he agreed. He signed up.</p>
<p>So that night we had a pandal program outside. I went outside to do pandal program, had a 103 fever, and came back in. Then this one Mr. Agarwal came, he is a real friendly life member that always hangs around there. He came back and said that “I am the director… you did not know who that Mr. Poddar was, he owns 43 companies, he is worth something like Rs. 500 crores, half a billion dollars. He never ever bows down to a Krishna deity, he is an Arya Samaji, they don’t believe in worshiping a Deity and he’s has never agreed to do anything. But he said by… because no sadhu ever begged him to do anything before and that somehow he took it up seriously that, when I was driving him home, he said ‘I promise to chant Hare Krishna and I am going to chant starting tonight!’”</p>
<p>He had his beads and he went to his home and started chanting his Hare Krishna that night. So Agarwal was one of the directors of this company. He said “This is the biggest thing that ever happened. This guy never did anything, you know of this type ever before. So this is a big breakthrough.” So in response, people do it, obviously some people forget but in general many people take it seriously, that is why we take their name and address to send them reminders, to keep the contact otherwise, surely, they will forget. But in general they do take it very seriously.</p>
<p>They have that tradition you know that if they promise, especially they make it a whole ritual, they come up and bow down before the Deity, they offer a flower, we give them a flower. We pssst, put the seal on it. They take it and touch it to their heads and then they come out. Sometimes we make them chant Hare Krishna over the microphone and someone announces, “This is…” You know “Gopalacharya.”You know, “Mr. Rangabhatti Gopalacharya” So when they come out…</p>
<p>I remember this getting people to chant Hare Krishna I found it to be a very inspiring thing. I had a big fight with… on this issue with Gokulacandra… no. Who is the big… He’s in Korea right now, used to be a big book distributor?
Devotee: (inaudible)</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: Anyway, that we had given two million books out in Bengal and people were coming up, they read the book, they’d come up to the devotees and they’d say that “I agree with your philosophy, now tell me what to do, I want to become Krishna conscious.” So then we would… you know the distributor naturally would say, “Well, buy another book!”</p>
<p>So either he buys a book or he does not have enough money, “So what next?”</p>
<p>So then we say “Why don’t you move in to Mayapur?”</p>
<hr />
<p>Transcribed by Jayaraseshwari devi dasi</p>
<p>Revised by Jagannatha dasa Brahmacari</p>
</div></div></div>Wed, 22 May 2013 04:39:18 +0000jayaraseshwari360 at http://jpsarchives.net19810610-Srimad-Bhagavatam.3.26.20-St.Louis-Literal-Versionhttp://jpsarchives.net/record/19810610-srimad-bhagavatam32620-stlouis-literal-version-392
<div class="field field-name-field-type-of-talk field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Type Of Talk:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_type_of_talk%3A2">Morning Class</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-location field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Location:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_location%3A43">Saint Louis - Missouri</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-book field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Book:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_book%3A21">Srimad Bhagavatam (SB)</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-vedabase-link field-type-link-field field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Vedabase link:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="http://vedabase.com/en/sb/3/26/20" target="_blank">http://vedabase.com/en/sb/3/26/20</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-date field-type-datetime field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Date:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><span class="date-display-single">Wednesday, June 10, 1981</span></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-unique-id field-type-text field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Unique ID:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">19810610-Srimad-Bhagavatam.3.26.20-St.Louis-Literal-Version</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-collection field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Collection:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/search?f[0]=field_collection%3A35">Enlightenment 1</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-soundcloud-embed-code field-type-text-long field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Audio player:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><iframe width="100%" height="166" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F178424325&show_artwork=true&maxheight=166&color=ff9900"></iframe></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><p>19810610-Srimad-Bhagavatam.3.26.20-St.Louis-Literal-Version</p>
<hr />
<p>The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapataka Swami on June 10th, 1981 in St. Louis. The class begins with a reading from the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto 3, Chapter 6, Text 20.</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami:</p>
<p>… effulgent mahat-tattva, which contains all the universes within itself, which is the root of all cosmic manifestations and which is not destroyed at the time of annihilation, swallows the darkness that covered the effulgence at the time of dissolution.</p>
<p>Translation with…</p>
<p>[break]</p>
<p>Since the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is ever existing, all-blissful and full of knowledge, His different energies are also ever existing in the dormant stage. Thus when the mahat-tattva was created, it manifested the material ego and swallowed up the darkness which covered the cosmic manifestation at the time of dissolution. This idea can be further explained. A person at night remains inactive, covered by the darkness of night, but when he is awakened in the morning, the covering of night, or the forgetfulness of the sleeping state, disappears. Similarly, when the mahat-tattva appears after the night of dissolution, the effulgence is manifested to exhibit the variegatedness of this material world.</p>
<p>Thus end the Purport… Bhaktivedānta Purport of Text 20, Chapter 26, Canto 3 of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, in the matter of Fundamental Principles of Material Nature.</p>
<p>So here it says how the mahat-tattva either dormant or manifest is always existing. The effulgent mahat tattva is what the Buddhists realize when they dismantle their complete body, mind and ego and then they go into the mahat tattva, but they never realize the self. You don’t go beyond the Viraja to the brahma jyoti. That is why they think that everything’s over. Because they didn’t realize the self and they dismantled everything else, and they think psst, “Finished. Bliss.” Actually for the Vaiṣṇavas, either this type of nirvāṇa that they uh, consider, the materialistic nirvāṇa or even the brahma stage of realizing the brahmajyoti is completely undesirable, you see.</p>
<p>Of course, every living entity is eternal and uh, has got pure spiritual knowledge, bliss, eternally as their nature. But when we’re in the material world, we forget our natural, blissful state because by the false ego we identify with this body. We identify with this body, mind, intelligence and thus we are forced to suffer, enjoy through the senses and through the mind. And the process of yoga, or to transcend this illusory identification and come to our… again to our original state of consciousness. Now, only Kṛṣṇa consciousness and the process of bhakti-yoga takes one up to the full potential of the living entity.</p>
<p>Other processes of uh, self-realization, yoga, Buddhism, they take one different levels, but never up to the complete potential of the living entity. Either up to the mahat tattva, or up to the brahmajyoti or even realizing Paramatma, the Supersoul in some uh… a mystic yoga process. But to actually go to the spiritual planets of Kṛṣṇa and to regain one’s original spiritual form, one’s siddh upalabdhi and one’s siddha-deha, the sac-cid-ānanda form of eternity, knowledge and bliss, this is only possible by the practice of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, bhakti-yoga. And amongst all the different types of bhakti-yoga or different uh… paramparās, actually Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu has combined all of them.</p>
<p>He has taken the essence from the four different sampradāyas – you know that there is Śiva sampradāya, Lakshmi sampradāya, Kumāra sampradāya and Lord Brahmā sampradāya. Of course we are following in the Lord Brahmā’s, technically speaking. But to differentiate Lord Caitanya followers call this the Brahma-Mādhva Gaudiya sampradāya. Because Lord Caitanya is Kṛṣṇa Himself, when He appeared in the Brahmā sampradāya, who was the first created being of the universe and a pure devotee, the father of Lord Śiva, etc., and the father of the Kumāras, so He however didn’t simply conform strictly but what Lord Caitanya did was not only did He take the essence of the Brahma-sampradāya but He took the essential factors from the other three sampradāyas as well.</p>
<p>He took two from Brahma, two from Śiva’s, Rudra’s, two from Lakṣmi and two from Kumāras. And thus it is predicted in the Padma Purana that the four bona fide sampradāyas, which are mentioned as Sri, Brahma, Rudra and Kumāras, they will all be combined in the Kali-yuga, you see. And this is due to the special mercy of Lord Caitanya that all the Kṛṣṇa conscious bhakti movements, bona fide movements worshipping the Supreme Personality of Godhead have been combined in the movement of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu. And as we preach in India we see more and more that the different sampradāyas, they are coming to join Lord Caitanya movement seeing that this actually contains the essence of all, and this is the perfect unity to give shelter to the whole world in the highest principle of pure devotional service, which is emulated or which is glorified by all of the different Vaiṣṇava ācāryas and great spiritual masters. So in this way different paths of self-realization are aiming at different goals. But the devotee is very, very uh, disgusted, afraid of having anything to do with some impersonal realization.</p>
<p>You see, one time Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura in his meditation, he was walking through Navadvipa dhāma and when he got to Rudradvipa there he saw a beautiful woman who was wearing white cloth, who was crying. And She… Her hair was a bit disheveled and she looked distraught and she started heading toward Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura and she was saying, "Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura” or whatever, you know, she was saying “Oh, I am so unfortunate, I am so unfortunate. Lord Caitanya has come and delivered all the fallen souls, but what about me? What about me? Everyone has left me. Even the great sages…” and she named some great sages, not Maitreya… “Markandeya and others. They have all left me. And now I am all alone. O Lord Caitanya! Have mercy on me!” Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura thought who is this, who is this person? Then she said, "I am Sayujya mukti." That is the mukti of merging in the light. “Everyone has left me now. Lord Caitanya has completely cleared me out! Everyone now is going for pure bhakti. Will He not have mercy on me?”</p>
<p>As soon as Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura heard the words Sahujya mukti he got scared and ran. He didn’t want anything to do with merging! She has to take it up directly with the Lord, we can’t get involved! So the devotees, we don’t want to take any chances, you see. The devotees don’t want anything to do with merging. In fact, Sanātana Gosvāmi was also describing how one devotee who had eternal relationship with Kṛṣṇa as a cowherd boy, on the way going back to Godhead, was crossing through the different levels of existence, going through Satya-loka and so on, going to Śiva-loka and so on. So as he was going towards the Vaikuṇṭha-loka through the brahmajyoti he was just going a bit too slow and so all of a sudden he started to merge, started to lose his identity and he was almost half way! "Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa!" And then went up to the Vaikuṇṭha-lokas, so.</p>
<p>Be very careful that we’re very fixed up in the personal conception of life. You can just understand that how when we are passing through, if we see anything we like when we are going through the different heavenly planets, "Oh, look at this siddha-loka, wow! Look at how they are flying around and producing things with mystic power. They have all these mystic powers, this is nice." Pst. Before you know, you will be there! Remember in the Bhāgavatam how it describes Pṛthu Mahāraja, when Pṛthu Mahārāja got on his airplane and followed by his wife, the denizens of the heavenly planets, they saw them go and go and go right by them and go completely up and up, out of sight. They were heading straight back to the spiritual planets. They weren't going and seeing the different material planets. You go past Siddha-loka, then you got Indra loka, there he's got so many of these dancing Urvashis, dancing apsaras, heavenly society girls. Everyone is enjoying, strolling around the parks, wonderful arrangements for sense gratification.</p>
<p>There in the heavenly planets–what the Christians and the Muslims they concentrate on these heavenly delights. So they don’t seem to have a clear conception of a spiritual world. But what their idea is heavenly planets are to enjoy wonderful material life. And that you get in these heavenly planets. You go up there, live off your material pious activities and then just like people pay to go on a vacation and live it up; and when they come back they have to work again. 499 dollars TWA, 3 days 4 nights European tour; they go there, live it up for four days and come back and start working again.</p>
<p>You are working here so many births and finally you accumulate some pious activity, go up to the heavenly planets, live it up for a little while, abrahma bhuvanal loke… abrahma bhuvanal loke, punar avārtinorjuna. That even you go to the Brahma-loka, again you have to come down, you see. This is the thing. So when you are going back to Godhead, naturally person can be passing all these places and sees "Oh, here is a very nice garden and so many nice women, so many handsome men, oh let us just, this looks like a pretty nice place, then you won’t go further!</p>
<p>You have to be fixed, eke ha kuru nandana – fixed on going back to home, fixed on serving Kṛṣṇa, fixed on just serving Kṛṣṇa and that desire to serve the Lord, that will take you to uh… to His association either in another universe in the material world or otherwise directly back where Lord Kṛṣṇa is, or directly back to the spiritual world but it will take you to Kṛṣṇa’s association. But as soon as you see anything in the material world which attracts, "Oh, let me just see this…” You see, all these desires for seeing the material world, they should become completely eradicated. One should take out that desire for sense gratification altogether for enjoying the material world and simply by cultivation, uncover the pure, real service attitude which is our spiritual birthright, which is what will carry us, just like a transcendental airplane, back to the spiritual, eternal service of the Lord.</p>
<p>So to also become one with that spiritual energy which are… All these energies are eternal. We see that these energies are also not destroyed. That desire of just being peaceful, “Oṁ śānti śānti oṁ śāntiḥ. People, “Oh, peace.”
You see, the Vaiṣṇavas, "Aagh!”</p>
<p>They don’t want that type of peace! They don’t want that type of calmness. Mother Saci, Yaśoda Māyi, they were not manifesting that type of calmness. Mother Yaśoda was going here and there, "Where is Kṛṣṇa? Where is Kṛṣṇa? Bring His butter. We have to heat up the milk for Him. Oh, where is Kṛṣṇa now?" She was always active. Vaiṣṇavas, they do not want this type of deathlike calmness, this type of uh, impersonal peace. They want that the… they want to serve Kṛṣṇa in ecstatic, loving devotion, you see. That is actually real uh, tran… higher level of peace. Peace, unity in diversity rather than unity in oblivion, you see. Devotees, they don’t want that type of peace, you see.</p>
<p>Those who are fed up with the material world and just want to end it all, that type of like almost suicidal tendency, they are attracted, "Oh, yes." And they are afraid when they see "Oh there is a personal relationship with God, and there’s transcendental activities and everything." In the Bhagavad-gītā Prabhupāda explains, they get afraid. They get afraid to commit themselves to a personal relationship, because they think, just like someone who has had so many lovers and everyone has always let them down, somehow everything has uh, ended up on the bad side, they think, “Well if I also give my love to Kṛṣṇa, then He may also let me down.” you see.</p>
<p>But this is the difference, that Kṛṣṇa is perfect. He is perfect, Siddheśvāra, He is the Master of all perfection, Yogeśvāra, He is the Supreme Lord of all mystic power. In every respect, He is a perfect person, you see. Paraṁa-puruṣa; He doesn’t let anyone down. He is perfect. And you can see from His pastime. He was the perfect husband in Dvārakā, He was the perfect son, He is the perfect friend of Arjuna, Uddhava, the perfect Master of Daruka and others. In every relationship, Kṛṣṇa is perfect, you see.</p>
<p>So in this way, we should not have any fears about our relationship with Kṛṣṇa; we should give up all these types of fears, you see, about these personal relationships in spiritual life. They are far, far beyond even the impersonal realization, they are the highest level. They are filled with sac-cid-ānanda, eternal, blissful knowledge. There is no material inebrieties and one never has to come back. nāpnuvanti mahātmānaḥ saṁsiddhiṁ paramāṁ gatāḥ. This is the… all perfection is achieved from whence one never has to come back. This way, devotees should be determined to reach the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa and shouldn’t have any fear, anger or illusion about it. We should be fixed in that devotional service.</p>
<p>So practically speaking how we do that, is that we maintain our personal relationship through the spiritual master. He has given us personal instructions. Sometimes people, they want to serve without a spiritual master. Why? Because the spiritual master is a person and he is giving personal likes and dislikes and personal advices and personal instructions how to serve Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>[aside] Be careful the garland is touching the floor. Skimpy on the sides of the cloth you’ve got there.</p>
<p>Then, you see, because in this way, we get a whole practice, we have a whole training, where Kṛṣṇa trains us through the spiritual master because the spiritual master can tell us what Kṛṣṇa wants. If we… if we practice with the spiritual master following his instruction, in this way, we will also be able to follow the instructions of Kṛṣṇa. Otherwise in one’s mind anyone can contact… can concoct some idea about serving Kṛṣṇa, "Yes, I’ll do this, I’ll do that." In this way actually there is no real surrender of one’s false ego, there is no real service, one is just doing whatever one likes and then calling that uh, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, you see.</p>
<p>So one needs a spiritual master both to know what Kṛṣṇa wants and what one doesn’t want and also to be trained and to practice serving in a personal relationship. And therefore, the spiritual master is described as uh, sākṣad-haritvena, that he is directly the svarupa of Kṛṣṇa, that he is Kṛṣṇa’s mercy expansion for training the disciples, for training the devotees.</p>
<p>Today we were reading in that song how uh, sri guru vaiṣṇava pada padme majhaiya mana. That we simply want to absorb our mind in the lotus feet of the guru, of the Vaiṣṇavas. Śrī. Śrī. They are auspicious, they are filled with opulence because they contain the special quality of mercy and benediction of Kṛṣṇa, you see.</p>
<p>Narottamadas Ṭhākura, he respected Śrīnivasācarya as the elder god brother. Doya koro Srinivasa Acharya Ṭhākura in the other song, it says like that. Actually, Srinivasa Acharya is the disciple of Hṛdayānanda, who is the disciple of Gauridas Pandit. And Narottamadas Ṭhākura is a disciple of Lokanātha Goswami. No. excuse me. I am very wrong. Śrīnivasācarya is a disciple of Gopāla Bhaṭṭa Gosvāmi and–who was it?-- Śyāmānanda Paṇḍita was the disciple of Hṛdayānanda das. Excuse me. So in that way, Srinivasa Acharya and Narottama in terms of their, both of there are direct associates of Lord Caitanya. Both Gopāla Bhaṭṭa and Lokanātha; they were directly ordered by Lord Caitanya to go to Vṛndavana. They both were directly serving Lord Caitanya.</p>
<p>You can say in that regard, they are on the same level but Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura, he respected Śrīnivāsa as a senior Vaiṣṇava. That was just a particular relationship, as a senior god brother. Why? I don’t know all the details, but that we find in his songs and in the pastimes that he highly respected him as a senior Vaiṣṇava although Śrīnivāsa would treat him like an equal, but Narottama would offer some extra respect, even more than he would offer to others… And actually Narottama became very, very close friends with Rāmacandra, who was a disciple of Srinivas, Rāmacandra saṅga māge. But Rāmacandra was the most advanced preacher. And so he would be travelling and preaching and sometimes he would go on preaching with Narottamadas Ṭhākura.</p>
<p>But because he was, although he was… In this way we have in the type of second generation after Lord Caitanya, we have a very similar situation as Prabhupāda has created in ISKCON because there we have senior Vaiṣṇavas and all of them would go to Narahari who was a direct associate of Lord Caitanya and he would give them instructions and guidance, although he wasn’t their guru in terms of initiation, but he was an associate of Lord Caitanya. He was associate who uh, did personal service, Narahari camara dhulāya to the Lord.</p>
<p>So in that way, they would go to him and Narahari would bless them and he would give them instruction how they could advance in Kṛṣṇa consciousness and they would accept that, you see as a very… even though their spiritual masters were also present in Vrndavana, but they didn’t say, Well, "You are not my guru. You are just an advanced Vaiṣṇava.” It wasn’t that type of mood. If a senior Vaiṣṇava gave an instruction which they could see as a transparent instruction, they accepted that and they respected those advanced Vaiṣṇavas. So in the same way now we have in ISKCON a type of the direct associates of Srila Prabhupāda and we have different Godbrothers, disciples of Srila Prabhupāda and we have different spiritual masters and their different disciples, some of them are more senior and some of them are more neophyte.</p>
<p>We have all these different levels and somehow it doesn’t have to be like a whole rigid type of formal uh, situation where everyone pulls out the exact date of their initiation and holds onto seniority. Which actually is what happened today practically in the other Gauḍiya Maṭha. They became little bit too stuck on various sādhana, principles. I went to one temple when I first was sent to India and they had worked out exactly, you couldn’t take prasad without telling them the exact date you were initiated as a brahmacāri. Of course if you are a sannyāsi you just automatically went upstairs, you were elevated above this. But the brahmacāris and the gṛhasthas, they had it worked out exactly what day and accordingly they had a… one after another, they sat down. In other words, if you were two days before then you were here and so on. That was nice in one sense, but I mean every day you know if you accidentally sat two devotees above the other then you pst you got pulled down and put in the other place.
“Don’t get puffed up.”</p>
<p>So what happened is that, it was nice in one sense to respect senior Vaiṣṇavas, I am not saying it is a completely bad system, but they… it became so much so that even if there might be you know, a Godbrother who was ten days younger or something like that, but who was actually very responsible, doing a lot of service, they could not recognize that person at all unless he took sannyāsa. And then among the sannyāsis, they had the same system.</p>
<p>So in that way when it came to respecting Śrīla Prabhupāda the first time he came, then some of his god brothers just because he was a gṛhastha longer and took sanyas later, they did not want to offer their respect even though he had done the greatest service of preaching all over the world. So their whole Godbrotherly love and Vaiṣṇava relationship was uh… was uh, obstructed by this type of artificial understanding. That is why a lot of people from the Gaudiya Maṭha, they have come over to ISKCON or they went… because here was a natural… although they have the same philosophy basically, but somehow the whole mood of preaching, the mood of book distribution, the mood of Vaiṣṇava, of course we can learn a lot more about respecting Vaiṣṇavas.</p>
<p>Prabhupad, of course, that was the one thing he felt we should learn more and more is to respect and to serve Vaiṣṇavas. He was repeatedly saying that in ISKCON you have to, all the devotees should learn to love and respect, love and trust the other Vaiṣṇavas and to respect them and not to offend any Vaiṣṇava, to avoid offence. He was repeatedly advising. Although we become so familiar on the other side that we don’t respect anyone. One extreme or the other. Of course I would say that Prabhupāda had the greatest desire for us to actually reach the perfection. So we always have to be working at the proper combination of respect, at the same time of actual love, not that it just becomes a formality but it is due to sri guru vaiṣṇava pade majhaiya mana. We actually from our heart, we really feel appreciation for all the Vaiṣṇavas.</p>
<p>That is why one of my goals in the next Mayapur festival, of course maybe none of you may be able to see it, but one of my goals is to actually show appreciation to all of the Vaiṣṇavas and we are going to initiate… trying to initiate special awards ceremony and joint darśanas of all the sannyāsis, gurus and GBCs during the festival in the evenings. And then we have a special awards ceremony, one night for all the saṅkīrtana awards of the year.</p>
<p>They have this in New Mayapur at the festival which is very wonderful where… What they would do is not just, not something like the life membership trust awards where they call out and give some useless abstract trophy, but where they glorify first of all for 5-6 minutes the different devotee, or the different temple involved, how they’ve struggled for Kṛṣṇa consciousness or how they have excelled in the particular service that they were doing.</p>
<p>Then they wouldn’t mention the name until they first glorified, create a little suspense and then they would call the name of the person and it was very wonderful because as you are going on hour after hour… first you thought “What is going on here?” but then after a while you started realizing it was so nice because you continue to hear… bhakta program leaders and gurukula teachers and saṅkīrtana devotees and so on and so forth. They are glorifying which ones have done a great sacrifice, which ones have done some special service for Prabhupāda in the movement. And this also helped to focus everybody, what is real Kṛṣṇa consciousness, what is our goal, what are our activities? In this way it really put everything very much in focus, what things we should be aspiring for, what things we should be trying to excel in? by glorifying even for short time, the different devotees who in that particular zone, we witnessed they were excelling.</p>
<p>So in the same way we would like to try to introduce some of these things in the Mayapur festival. And one night would be the sankirtan awards. And other nights, things like different ministries, and committee like BBT, for publishing and things like that and for different ministries like Public Affairs who have done some excellent service for public affairs or for farming and other things like that. Also in the future we would like to give out Sanskrit titles. Prabhupāda suggested this for devotees who have dedicated themselves to a particular service, and who have reached a certain level of uh, steadiness and a certain level of expertise, that uh, they are an example that others could follow and learn from. Not that we give a person a title that he becomes falsely proud or something but it is a responsibility. Just like sannyāsa is a responsibility in one aspect.</p>
<p>So this should be a responsibility say the cooks who have become excellent cooks, then they get a certain title as a cook. And once they reach a certain level of excellence… and in the whole society, maybe half a dozen or something depends how many qualify, of that level of cook. And then naturally people will go to them and it would be part of their responsibilities as brāhmaṇas to train other people how to reach that standard of excellence in cooking and puja and… or Deity worship and other factors. So Prabhupāda, he didn't want that devotees would feel some dissatisfaction in doing different kinds of services, but rather we need expert cooks, expert pujaris, expert gurukula teachers, not that after five years a person says “Well, I gotta become a temple president otherwise I am not going to go back to Godhead.” or something, it is not like that. Every service is very and most important and it requires certain devotees should excel in different services so others can be trained. Not that everybody has to do one service.</p>
<p>Of course, naturally already the focus is on saṅkīrtana and other services but we also want even the sankirtan preachers, we need to see the beautiful Deities when we come back, nicely decorated, to purify our mind and to help us to meditate on Kṛṣṇa so that, we go out there and preach we have the purity to give us more and more force. So we are trying to arrange a program at the Mayapur festival that this may be encouraged at least, we hope. We hope that uh, Nitai-Gaura, Prabhupāda and Bhaktisiddhānta will give us some mercy for being able to do that.</p>
<p>But this basic idea of respecting Vaiṣṇavas, of respecting the spiritual master, of serving Kṛṣṇa, these are the most important things. In fact, serving guru and Vaiṣṇava and taking their association is uh, most important for us in the conditional state, for everyone, anyone in the conditional stage, anyone who wants to advance in pure devotional service. Even we find that the four Kumaras, when they also came and met Pṛthu maharaj and Pṛthu asked them questions, they said that “You have asked such a nice question that we feel benefitted by this. Now we will have a chance to become more purified by being able to answer such nice questions.”</p>
<p>So even for very advanced preachers like the four Kumaras… who can be more advanced than they are? they are sampradāya-ācāryas, the beginner of a sampradāya, even they were glorifying the association just of a qualified vaiṣṇava devotee who could ask even good questions, because it gave them a chance to glorify the Lord and to explain pure bhakti, which uh, purifies even the preachers, you see. We go on with our purification even when one is pure one becomes more and more elevated in devotional service simply by serving.</p>
<p>So in this way the devotees are always anxious for association with other Vaiṣṇavas to give them the opportunity to advance more and more in the service of Kṛṣṇa. So we can understand these things by studying the songs and the writings of our previous ācāryas and even by understanding their pastimes how uh, during… after Lord Caitanya, these different ācāryas, they would have their intimate relationships and how they've cooperated with each other for preaching in the movement of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu.</p>
<p>So Prabhupāda is so kind that he has created uh, an identical type of uh, circumstance in the International Society for Krishna consciousness where everyone works together in a very cooperative spirit and where although we follow the social etiquette and uh, formalities as are necessary, at the same time that love, faith and uh, appreciation of other services take predominance. This is a type of a very fluid, wonderful situation and we can of course only perfect that more and more by following in the footsteps of our previous ācāryas. Thus we can relish the association of Kṛṣṇa, Lord Caitanya through the association of the Vaiṣṇavas, through the association of the spiritual master, through our service, through the classes of Bhāgavatam and through worshipping the Deity and performing saṅkīrtan we can continually relish these different associations.</p>
<p>And thus time goes by very quickly. We gradually come into eternal time where the… the passing of days or weeks no longer becomes the same. One is actually already on the transcendental platform and very soon even though we say, “Well we have to wait so long, sixty years we have to live.” sixty years goes by in just a short time for us especially in Kṛṣṇa consciousness because there is never a dull moment, there is never a material moment, it is always on the transcendental time schedule which makes every moment, every second, uh, very enjoyable, very transcendentally uh, empowered to bring us closer and closer to Kṛṣṇa. So the time goes very quickly, before we know it, we will be ready to go back to Kṛṣṇa, we just have to make sure that we don’t allow any gaps. Ahaituki apratihata. Apratihata– there shouldn’t be any gaps, no spaces. We should keep a continuous service going to Śrī… our spiritual master, without any separation, you see.</p>
<p>In that way Srila Prabhupāda showed continuously his service to Bhaktisiddhānta… of course how can we analyse his service? Actually, we can understand if we can even hold up a candle to his service, that if we could follow just to some degree the intensity of the schedule that he would follow, the intensity of the preaching that he would do, we will be assured success.</p>
<p>Actually Srila Prabhupāda is also an ācārya, sampradāya ācārya, he has established a sampradāya within a sampradāya and he wants that we continue with his family tree and that this will be the main branch of Lord Caitanya’s tree that can accommodate and unite and bring all the different branches of the Gaudiya sampradāya together and thus bring all the different branches of all the sampradāyas together. So that requires that now we have to completely absorb ourselves in pure devotional service so intensely, get rid of all the different types of weeds and distractions so perfectly that naturally we will be drawing in all the sincere diversive elements and we will be getting the full mercy of Lord Caitanya for actually delivering the whole world. It is Lord Caitanya’s prediction that the whole world will be delivered. It’s just a question of who will get that mercy.</p>
<p>Now Prabhupāda has already done half the work. We cannot rest on laurels that well Prabhupāda did half the work so we automatically should do the other half. That we have to earn it like Prabhupāda earned it. He endeavored, he took sacrifice, he went through various ordeals or various uh, tests by Kṛṣṇa and he passed. He always chose to serve the order of his spiritual master over any other idea. And if Prabhupāda said, “If… as long as we are more attached to Lord Caitanya’s lotus feet, as long as we are more attached to the orders of the spiritual master, which are the representative of Lord Caitanya’s lotus feet, then maya’s idea will not hold any attraction for us.” you see. This is the secret, we have to step by step simply refine our desires to simply desire to do whatever will please Kṛṣṇa, whatever will please Caitanya Mahāprabhu through the spiritual master. Thus we will uh, be able to get that special mercy by Lord Caitanya’s uh, benediction to actually deliver the whole rest of the world, whatever is still left in Srila Prabhupāda’s mission. And that is… of course for us will be the greatest opportunity to be instruments in the hands of Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>We should surrender to become instruments, we cannot do on our own, it is not our personal power, any individual’s power, it is only the mercy of Kṛṣṇa, Caitanya Mahāprabhu coming down. We have to become via media, transparent media, we have to surrender our false ego to the lotus feet of Lord Caitanya and act as His instruments, all of us together in different ways and thus ISKCON will get the special empowerment, which it is already getting no doubt it is already doing that work and it will continue to grow and do the same as long as we work on this particular aspect of following very strictly in the footsteps of our previous ācāryas, by their mercy we will get the mercy of Lord Caitanya which is going to benedict the whole world.</p>
<p>jāya śrī-kṛṣṇa caitanya</p>
<p>prabhu nityānanda</p>
<p>śrī advaita gadādhara</p>
<p>śrīvasādi gaura bhakta vṛnda.</p>
<p>Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa</p>
<p>Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare/</p>
<p>Hare Rāma Hare Rāma</p>
<p>Rāma Rāma Hare Hare</p>
<p>Devotee: Srila Ācāryapāda ki</p>
<p>Devotees: Jaya!</p>
<p>Is there time for questions? Yes?</p>
<p>Question: How should one deal with senior devotees if one has… sees the devotee has some problem or has some suggestion to make to a senior devotee, say a Godbrother, senior Godbrother, how does one go about… (inaudible) attracting Māyā?</p>
<p>Jayapataka Swami: It is a situation that I wouldn’t envy. Actually one should avoid giving advice to senior Vaiṣṇavas as far as possible, but uh, of course sometimes if a situation comes up generally we consider that we are not really in a position to offer someone advice unless we are at an equal or greater level of service. At least, I couldn’t off hand just imagine what type of situation might come up where the person was in uh, an inferior position of service and wanted to offer advice. But uh, without going into all these ramifications if somehow or other one finds one’s self in the position of uh, giving some kind of instruction to a senior Vaiṣṇava, then one would have to offer that in the most humble uh, way and very apologetic that there is some doubt, you see something which is agitating your mind and which is making you feel that possibly it is not uh, correct and so just to alleviate the doubt as a senior Vaiṣṇava you are requesting that he would please explain that whether his activities actually bona fide Kṛṣṇa consciousness because you are looking up to him for example, and it's creating a doubt in your mind, because from what you have been taught it doesn’t seem to be correct.</p>
<p>In this way in some indirect polite way if one could ask like that, then it is very hard for a senior Vaiṣṇava to really feel offended. But if you just come and say, "Well listen, you appear to be in Māyā, you are doing this…” Of course, your life will get smashed. But if you ask in that way of course then, maintaining your relationship, that we are seeing him as a senior Vaiṣṇava but you are not seeing his activities to be exemplary of that, and it’s creating… then naturally he will more than likely to be, to feel… if he is in fact wrongly situated, then he will feel somewhat responsible to show a good example and will see that you are not saying out of some kind of enviousness, but that you are actually concerned for your own spiritual life and his spiritual life as well. It is a type of a sticky situation.</p>
<p>Lord Caitanya would maintain this type of formal uh, relationship with different Vaiṣṇavas. Sometimes… of course He was ultimately the Supreme Lord, so sometimes He would do other things too but generally He would try to maintain that type of activity. In that way sometimes you would find like with Dāmodara Pandit, He would say, “Well, Dāmodara is My senior, I can’t say anything with Him.” and this and that. Of course sometimes indirectly it was like a criticism because although he was a senior Vaiṣṇava, of course Lord Caitanya was the guru of everyone. So that requires a lot of intelligence to be able to present something in a palatable way when the subject matter is unpalatable for someone. No one wants to hear how they are in Māyā. Of course the spiritual master, he directly tells this type of devotee in many different ways how they need to be corrected. But when you are dealing with equals or with even superiors, sometimes a uh, junior devotee is put as responsible for senior devotees, but actually the person is more… more responsible maybe. So it requires a lot of Vaiṣṇava vision to actually be able to see that.</p>
<p>The Gaudiya mission in many ways, they lost that type of perspective. So, what happened was like the disciple of Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, Bhakti-Pradīpa Tīrtha, he is different than Bhakti-Vilāsa Tirtha. But he could accept, he could understand that actually my grand disciple, my nephew Bhaktisiddhānta Saraswati Ṭhākura is actually completely empowered, pure devotee. And so he accepted Bhaktisiddhānta either as a sannyāsa-guru or as a śikṣa-guru, I forget exactly, but he respected him like a spiritual master. Even though there may be some formal thing but he was actually a junior. But because he had exhibited so many exalted Vaiṣṇava qualities, he wanted his spiritual association on that level. This may happen in the future.</p>
<p>Of course now, nothing like that is exactly happened where disciples of the present day guru have really shown that much advancement yet, but say in subsequent generations one great ācārya may appear as someone’s disciple. And then Prabhupāda said that the cream will rise to the top. And if they actually become so dynamic in preaching then even if someone may be senior by years or by relationship but if someone shows such a great uh, quality of devotional service, that may come that there will be a test whether they can recognize a person by quality or just by other external aspects.</p>
<p>So Bhakti-Pradīpa Tīrtha, he accepted Bhaktisiddhānta in that way but after Bhaktisiddhānta Prabhupāda left, actually the most qualified person was Bhakti-Pradīpa Tīrtha. But then some of the disciples of Bhaktisiddhānta were saying that he is not technically our god brother, even though he was much more senior and much more learned, they tried to do a little politics. So Bhakti-Pradīpa Tīrtha saw that, “Well, if it’s like that…” He just went off and did his own devotional service and did not want to get involved in politics. So this happens in Vaiṣṇava, the whole material world is kali-yuga and we have to be careful that we avoid this type of mistake. Prabhupāda would explain these things to us so we would not do that thing.</p>
<p>Of course by having a GBC body, this way we get protected because we work under committee and not under individual because there is always a tendency to resent one person, there may be some personality differences, but to work under a committee, this was started by Bhaktivinoda in his nama-haṭṭa. He had a ten-man paṣcāyat and then Bhaktisiddhānta said to do it. At least started it but they did not carry it forward. So Prabhupāda was always commenting that “They never followed Bhaktisiddhānta’s order. He never said to have one ācārya, he always said to have a Governing Body Commission. You manage everything by Governing Body Commission, you see.</p>
<p>One person may even be misled or one person may have difficulty, the unity of the movement has to be preserved by working under the system of Governing Body Commission. So that way in the Governing Body Commission you have different type of devotees, but they are all there because somehow or other they have done some personal service for Srila Prabhupāda, they know Prabhupāda's desires, or they have excelled in some preaching field. So in this way they have a understanding of responsibility for the society. Even there may be other, or equally advanced devotees outside still in principle that they know what Prabhupāda wanted, we follow under this basis system that this is what the previous ācāryas wanted rather than a single Acharya system which is more vulnerable. This helps us to take that humble attitude in a society wide basis.</p>
<p>Hare Kṛṣṇa!</p>
<p>Devotee: Śrīla Ācāryapāda ki!</p>
<p>Devotees: Jaya!</p>
<hr />
<p>Transcribed by: Jayaraseshwari dd 24 July 2014</p>
<p>Revised by Jagannatha dasa Brahmacari</p>
</div></div></div>Wed, 22 May 2013 04:39:18 +0000jayaraseshwari392 at http://jpsarchives.net